Whitebait are young fish; in
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
the term applies to young
herringHerring are relatively small oily fish of the genus Clupea found in the shallow, temperate waters of the North Pacific and the North Atlantic oceans, including the Baltic Sea. Two species of Clupea are currently recognized, the Atlantic herring and the Pacific herring , each of which may be...
, but in other parts of the world it is used for similar fish of other species. Whitebait are tender and edible. The entire fish is eaten including head, fins and gut but typically each 'bait' is only 25-50 mm in length and about 3 mm in
cross sectionIn geometry, a cross-section is the intersection of a body in 2-dimensional space with a line, or of a body in 3-dimensional space with a plane, etc. More plainly, when cutting an object into slices one gets many parallel cross-sections....
.
Whitebaiting is the activity of catching whitebait.
New ZealandNew Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses , and numerous smaller islands, most notably Stewart Island/Rakiura and the Chatham Islands. The indigenous Māori named New Zealand Aotearoa, commonly translated as The Land of the Long White Cloud...
whitebait are the juvenile of certain
galaxiidThe Galaxiids are a family of mostly small freshwater fish. Representatives occur throughout the southern hemisphere, including South Africa, South America, New Zealand, Australia, Lord Howe Island, New Caledonia and the Falkland Islands. One species of galaxiid, Galaxias maculatus, is probably...
s which mature and live as adults in rivers with native forest surrounds.
Whitebait are young fish; in
EuropeEurope is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus Mountains , and the Black Sea to the southeast...
the term applies to young
herringHerring are relatively small oily fish of the genus Clupea found in the shallow, temperate waters of the North Pacific and the North Atlantic oceans, including the Baltic Sea. Two species of Clupea are currently recognized, the Atlantic herring and the Pacific herring , each of which may be...
, but in other parts of the world it is used for similar fish of other species. Whitebait are tender and edible. The entire fish is eaten including head, fins and gut but typically each 'bait' is only 25-50 mm in length and about 3 mm in
cross sectionIn geometry, a cross-section is the intersection of a body in 2-dimensional space with a line, or of a body in 3-dimensional space with a plane, etc. More plainly, when cutting an object into slices one gets many parallel cross-sections....
.
Whitebaiting is the activity of catching whitebait.
New Zealand Whitebait
New ZealandNew Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses , and numerous smaller islands, most notably Stewart Island/Rakiura and the Chatham Islands. The indigenous Māori named New Zealand Aotearoa, commonly translated as The Land of the Long White Cloud...
whitebait are the juvenile of certain
galaxiidThe Galaxiids are a family of mostly small freshwater fish. Representatives occur throughout the southern hemisphere, including South Africa, South America, New Zealand, Australia, Lord Howe Island, New Caledonia and the Falkland Islands. One species of galaxiid, Galaxias maculatus, is probably...
s which mature and live as adults in rivers with native forest surrounds. The
larvaA larva is a young form of animal with indirect development, going through or undergoing metamorphosis ....
e of these galaxiids are swept down to the ocean where they hatch and the sprats then move back up their home rivers as whitebait.
The most common whitebait species in New Zealand is the
common galaxiasCommon names:Common Galaxias, Inanga, Common Jollytail, Jollytail, Ika, PuyenThe common galaxias, Galaxias maculatus, is a species of fish from the galaxiid family that is very widespread in the southern hemisphere. It is a slim narrow fish with a forked tail and as an adult it lives...
or inanga, which lays its eggs during spring tides in Autumn on the banks of a river amongst grasses that are flooded by the tide. The next spring tide causes the eggs to hatch into larvae which are then flushed down to the sea with the outgoing tide where they form part of the ocean's plankton mass. After six months the developed juveniles return to rivers and move upstream to live in freshwater.
New Zealand whitebait are caught in the lower reaches of the rivers using small open-mouthed hand-held nets although in some parts of the country where whitebait are more plentiful, larger (but not very large) set nets may be used adjacent to river banks. Whitebaiters constantly attend the nets in order to lift them as soon as a shoal enters the net. Otherwise the whitebait quickly swim back out of the net. Typically, the small nets have a long pole attached so that the whitebaiter can stand on the river bank and scoop the net forward and out of the water when whitebait are seen to enter it. The larger nets may be set into a platform extending into the river from the bank and various forms of apparatus used to lift the net.
Whitebaiting in New Zealand is a seasonal activity with a fixed and limited period enforced during the period that the whitebait normally migrate up-river. The strict control over net sizes and rules against blocking the river to channel the fish into the net permit sufficient quantity of whitebait to reach the adult habitat and maintain stock levels. The whitebait themselves are very sensitive to objects in the river and are adept at dodging the nets.
The New Zealand whitebait is small, sweet and tender with a delicate taste that is easily over-powered if mixed with stronger ingredients when cooked. The most popular way of cooking whitebait in New Zealand is the
whitebait fritterA fritter is any kind of food coated in batter and deep fried. The word comes from the Latin *frīctūra by way of Old French and Middle English...
, which is essentially an
omeletteAn omelette or omelet is a preparation of beaten egg quickly cooked with butter or oil in a frying pan, usually folded around a filling such as cheese, vegetables, meat , or some combination of the above...
containing whitebait. Purists use only the
egg whiteEgg white is the common name for the clear liquid contained within an egg. It is the cytoplasm of the egg, which until fertilization is a single cell . It consists mainly of about 15% proteins dissolved in water...
in order to minimise interfering with the taste of the bait. Foreigners frequently react with revulsion when shown uncooked whitebait, which resembles slimy, translucent worms.
The combination of the fishing controls, a limited season and the depletion of habitat as a result of forest felling during the era of colonisation results in limited quantities being available on the market. Whitebait is very much a delicacy and commands high prices to the extent that it is the most costly fish on the market, if available. It is normally sold fresh in small quantities, although some is frozen to extend the sale period. Nevertheless, whitebait can normally only be purchased during or close to the netting season.
Australian Whitebait
In Australia whitebait refers to the juvenile stage of several predominantly
galaxiasThe Galaxiids are a family of mostly small freshwater fish. Representatives occur throughout the southern hemisphere, including South Africa, South America, New Zealand, Australia, Lord Howe Island, New Caledonia and the Falkland Islands. One species of galaxiid, Galaxias maculatus, is probably...
species during their return to freshwater from the marine phase of their lifecycle. Comments for New Zealand are generally applicable.
Species referred to as whitebait in Australia include
Common galaxiasCommon names:Common Galaxias, Inanga, Common Jollytail, Jollytail, Ika, PuyenThe common galaxias, Galaxias maculatus, is a species of fish from the galaxiid family that is very widespread in the southern hemisphere. It is a slim narrow fish with a forked tail and as an adult it lives...
G. maculatus,
Climbing galaxiasThe climbing galaxias, Galaxias brevipinnis, is a Galaxiid of the fish family Galaxiidae found in Australia, New Zealand and nearby islands....
G. brevipinnis,
Spotted galaxias-Introduction:Spotted galaxias are a largish, primarily-freshwater galaxias species found in southern Australia. Spotted galaxias are perhaps the most beautiful of the Australian galaxias species...
G. truttaceus,
Tasmanian whitebaitThe Tasmanian whitebait or Derwent whitebait, Lovettia sealii, is a galaxiid of the family Galaxiidae, found only in Tasmania, Australia. It grows to a length of up to 8 cm....
Lovettia sealii,
Tasmanian mudfishThe Tasmanian mudfish, Neochanna cleaveri, is a small Australian amphidromous fish in the galaxiid family, of the order Osmeriformes.- Distribution :...
Neochanna cleaveri, and
Tasmanian smeltThe Tasmanian smelt, Retropinna tasmanica, is a small, pelagic freshwater smelt found in lowland streams of Tasmania, Australia....
Retropinna tasmanica.
Whitebait were once subject to a substantial commercial fishery but today only recreational fishers are permitted to gather them, under strict conditions and for a limited season.
United Kingdom Whitebait
The first record of whitebait appearing on English menus dates back to 1612, but it wasn't until the 1780s that they became fashionable in restaurants. Back then, the fishermen and chefs who caught and cooked whitebait, along with support from contemporary biologists believed that it was a separate and distinct type of fish. The French naturalist Valenciennes even instituted a new genus,
Rogenia, to accommodate the new 'species'. However whitebait is used in the United Kingdom as a collective term for the fry of Clupeoid fish, members of the herring and sprat family.
In 1903, Dr James Murie, in his 'Report on the sea fisheries and fishing industry of the Thames estuary' conducted studies on the contents of boxes sold as whitebait, the report discovered that some boxes of whitebait contained up to 23 species of immature fish, including the fry of eel, plaice, whiting, herring sprat and bass, along with shrimp crab octopus and even jellyfish.
In the
United KingdomThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a sovereign state located off the northwestern coast of continental Europe. It is an island country, spanning an archipelago including Great Britain, the northeastern part of Ireland, and many small islands...
today, whitebait generally refers to young
spratClupeidae is the family of the herrings, shads, sardines, hilsa and menhadens. It includes many of the most important food fishes in the world.-Description and biology:...
s, most commonly herring. They are normally deep-fried, coated in flour or a light
batterBatter is a liquid mixture, usually based on one or more flours combined with liquids such as water, milk or beer. Egg is a common component. Often a leavening agent is included to aerate and fluff up the batter as it cooks, or the mixture may be naturally fermented for this purpose as well as to...
, and served very hot with sprinkled
lemonThe lemon is a small evergreen tree originally native to Asia, and is also the name of the tree's oval yellow fruit. The fruit is used for culinary and nonculinary purposes throughout the world – primarily for its juice, though the pulp and rind are also used, mainly in cooking and baking...
juice and bread and butter.
White bait are very hard to buy fresh unless you are down at a fishing harbour early in the morning as most are frozen on the boat.
For Londoners in the 19th century and before, summer excursions down the Thames to
GreenwichGreenwich is a district in south-east London, England, on the south bank of the River Thames in the London Borough of Greenwich. It is best known for its maritime history and as giving its name to the Greenwich Meridian and Greenwich Mean Time.The town became the site of a Royal palace, the...
or
BlackwallBlackwall is an area of the East End of London, situated in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets on the north bank of the Thames River.The district around Blackwall Stairs was known as Blackwall by at least the fourteenth century. This presumably derives from the colour of the river wall,...
to dine on whitebait were popular. For instance, the
CabinetA Cabinet is a body of high-ranking members of government, typically representing the executive branch. It can also sometimes be referred to as the Council of Ministers, an Executive Council, or Executive Committee.- Overview :...
undertook such a trip every year shortly before the prorogation of
ParliamentA parliament is a legislature, especially in those countries whose system of government is based on the Westminster system modeled after that of the United Kingdom. The name is derived from the French parlement, the action of parler : a parlement is a discussion. The term came to mean a meeting at...
.
Given that UK and imported Whitebait still consists of immature herring, sprat, sardines, mackerel, bass and many others, it is not an ecologicial foodstuff. Removing these fish at such a juvenile stage, before they have had a chance to grow and reproduce, might severely reduce future fish stocks. The Marine Conservation Society (MCS) is the only non-government organisation to provide independent information on the sustainability of fish stocks and species around the world, and to have a rating system for fish sustainability, in order to safeguard future stocks. The MCS suggests avoiding eating and purchasing the juvenile whitebait as it is detrimental to sustainable fish populations.
Chinese Whitebait
Chinese whitebait is raised in fish farms and plentiful quantities are produced for export. The Chinese whitebait is larger than the New Zealand whitebait and not nearly so delicate. The frozen product is commonly available in food stores and supermarkets at reasonable prices.
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